Status of DIP in India and possible remedies

        In this post, problems faced by Digital Image Processing (DIP) field in Indian academia is discussed.  Potential of DIP is highlighted and  underlying strength is discussed. Measures that has to be taken to achieve the potential is presented.

I. Problems

1. First and foremost weakness is prevailing misconceptions about the field.  They are listed as follows
• Bible for DIP is written by Gonzalez (Rafael C. Gonzalez and Richard E. Woods, Digital Image Processing, 2nd edition, 2002) and the book had more emphasis on mathematics. In recent editions, maths content was gradually reduced to make it convenient to computer science students also. Thus  phrase like “DIP is nothing but two dimensional spacial signal processing,” makes most of the people amused.
• Most of the faculty and students have a notion that DIP is all about compression, compression and compression. I don't know how this notion crept into academic community. If some one say I am doing my research on image processing then next question will be “whether you are working on image compression?”
• Academia has no qualms to associate Digital Signal Processing (DSP) subject (In American parlance - course) with mathematics. It is adjudged as a core electrical engineering subject. But 2D signal processing ie. DIP is not associated with maths and offered as elective course. What a pity.
2. The next important weakness is, there are only handful people who really know DIP. To score good marks in examination with minimal effort, DIP is the best option. But one has to struggle more hard to become an expert.  The reason is very simple. One has to get out of the  prevailing misconceptions trap.
3. There is a small pool of DIP experts only exist. Thus they nearly face no competition and there is no incentive for them to  improve their knowledge.
4.  Most of the professors in engineering colleges are from communication, networks, and vlsi background.  Almost all bright students prefer to work under a professor for their project work. Thus best talent are not available to DIP field.
5. In most of the engineering colleges in India, DIP is offered as an elective subject (In American parlance - course). It is studied in last semester B.E. or B.Tech. programme. Thus students loose an opportunity to do project in DIP. Even if they do a project, they lack the theoretical foundation. It results in low grades or marks and DIP field is falsely branded “unfit."

II. Potential

• There are really very few experts are there. So there is enough vacuum is there, that needs to be filled. Put it poetically “DIP is less trodden path.” It is difficult to travel but rich dividend is waiting makes worthwhile to walk alone.
• DIP applications are innumerable. So one can establish their expertise on any one of the applications.

III. Strengths

1. A Internet enabled laptop with MATLAB can act as a Lab. So every electronics engineering student can own a DIP lab.
2. Good amount of information is available in Internet. So one can download codes and run on their systems to understand the concepts.
3. Outcome of DIP is an image. So one can implement their methods / algorithms on computers. As one can have actual result, it really improves the confidence as well as self esteem. In areas like communication, networks and vlsi they have to be contented with simulations. They are supposed to work in labs of  premier institutes to come out with actual result (ex.  a integrated chip).
4. International journal “Transactions on Image Processing” is published from IEEE (Institute of  Electrical and Electronics Engineers) association. The USA based IEEE association is the largest and most respected electrical engineering association in the world. Impact factor of transactions on image processing is more than three (3.199). This is a very high score for a engineering journal.  This means there is huge scope and impact on society in doing research in image processing.
5. The cost of cameras, scanners, computing hardware and displays are coming down. Thus  inspection systems (Biscuit, rice etc), activity detection systems  can be built with low cost. This will create a huge market for new products and work flows.

IV. Improvements

1. People working in Image processing should come together and they have to work in tandem for the welfare of DIP. This in turn will help them to grow. One may think why cant start an association? Yes, nice idea. But due to Indian mindset, office bearers and members will spend much time on playing politics than doing something for DIP.
2. In the universities DIP has to be given due importance.
3. DIP awareness camps has to be organized by institutions. So as to make popular among students.
4. Motivated youngsters are the need of the hour to build research capability and  to involve in DIP promoting activity. The prime objective of young researchers should be doing research and not acquiring PhD degree.
5. Free access to quality content. For example a wikipedia for DIP (dIPedia).
6. A trainer kit has to developed or popularized, which permits to do image processing applications on embedded systems.
7. If smart phone image processing trainer kits (Android, Symbian, and Windows mobile based) made available then students will come out with beautiful applications. For example a smart phone app (application or executable program) is written to detect presence of diseases in agriculture farms and suggest remedies.  Next, If someone hovers the smart phone on unknown plant then the app  can come out with the botanical name and local name. These apps can be  greatly helpful to public as well as DIP researchers.

After reading this post, some may wonder what is my contribution to DIP?   Answer is 'not much'. This post is culmination my thoughts and few failed activities. Earlier I started a website especially for image processing. Due to various reasons I was not able to carry out regular updates and finally it  failed.  Then I started this blog to bring out information that are not covered in the typical textbooks.